"I can think of no better forum for a composer with a passion for learning the traditions of so-called progressive American opera theater than AOP’s program."
-- Daron Hagen, composer/guest C&V instructor
The primary focus of Composers & the Voice is to give composers and librettists extensive experience working collaboratively with singers on writing for the voice and contemporary opera stage.
The 2011/12 series is being expanded to incorporate training for composers and librettists in acting, improv games, and libretto development. Composer-Librettist teams will also be invited to apply for the first time in the upcoming season.
The Composers & the Voice Workshop Series includes 15 workshop sessions between September and May. Workshops periodically include in-depth exploration and involvement in the libretto-writing process and visits by established composers and librettists in the later workshop sessions. The composers are encouraged to take risks and push the boundaries, with the safety net of closed readings always in mind. These pieces are written on very tight deadlines, usually in 3 weeks, with revisions coming through conversations with the performers and fellow composers.
At the end of the seven-month program, American Opera Projects will present the results of the participants’ work in two public performances – First Glimpse, a concert of songs in May 2012, and Six Scenes, an evening of short opera scenes presented by AOP’s First Chance series at the start of the 2012-2013 season. One of these scenes will be selected to receive a staged reading at Manhattan School of Music in Spring 2013, as part of its annual New Works Sampler.
Previous seasons of Composers & the Voice have featured guest lectures from noted artists such as composers Mark Adamo (Little Women, Lysistrata) and Daron Hagen (Amelia) and librettist Mark Campbell (Volpone, Songs from an Unmade Bed).
Past “Composer Chairs,” sponsorships named in honor of mentors and their support of Composers & the Voice, have included Mr. Adamo (pictured left, at a C&V party) and composers Tan Dun, Stephen Schwartz, Tobias Picker, Richard Peaslee and Lee Hoiby, each of whom made themselves available to our composers for one-on-one discussions and feedback.
Composers & the Voice is made possible in part by a generous multi-year award from
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Fellows in the C&V program are supported by deeply appreciated funding from
The New York Community Trust Edward and Sally Van Lier Fund and Musical Arts Fund.
Past AOP Composers & the Voice fellows have received grants and honors from the following organizations: Aaron Copland Fund for Music, ASCAP, BMI, the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the American Music Center, the American Composers Forum, OPERA America, the National Endowment for the Arts, Meet the Composer, the Argosy Foundation Contemporary Music Fund, the Fulbright Foundation, the Atlantic Center for the Arts, the Douglas Moore Fellowship, Tapestry New Opera Works, the Frederick Loewe Foundation, New Dramatists, and the Martha Baird Rockefeller Foundation.
